Chapter 89: The Quarantine Station (Part 2)

The person in charge of the “purification” on the women’s side was Ai Beibei, the wife of Qian Shuiting from the North American detachment. In the United States, she was engaged in epidemiological research and was really not suited for this kind of “purification” work. The only reason she was called to preside over it was that she was the only female doctor in the health group. Seeing the scene of crying and screaming that shook the heavens, she, who had always been a good wife and loving mother, was at a loss. She hurriedly comforted them, “Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid, it’s just a haircut, for hygiene reasons—”

But the women didn’t listen to her at all. The sound of crying was contagious, and a wave of crying filled the air above the quarantine station. The temporary workers, of course, would not show any tenderness towards the fairer sex and continued with the shaving. Ai Beibei was so anxious that she stomped her feet, repeatedly telling the rough-handed female workers, “Be gentle, don’t scare them!”

The female temporary workers didn’t have so many scruples. Their pay was half a tael of rice for each head shaved, so they all scrambled to be first, afraid of losing out if they shaved too few. With such fast and efficient movements, they soon shaved the heads of all fifty-three women, young and old, completely bald, and then hurried over to the men’s side to continue their money-making journey.

Perhaps they realized that crying was useless, or perhaps they were tired. The noise slowly subsided. Someone opened the cangue boards one by one and herded them on towards the bathhouse.

The bathhouse at the quarantine station took some effort from the engineering department to build. The pressurized water supply still used a water tower, and the water was drawn from a filtration pool on the bank of the Wenlan River, having undergone simple sand and gravel filtration and sedimentation. The pipes were made of bamboo, and the water taps used the simplest lever-type switches. The lack of seals meant that the entire piping and switch system constantly leaked. The solution was to install a separate gate valve on the water tower, which was closed when no one was bathing to prevent waste from water seepage.

The bathroom was divided into two sections, for men and women, separated by a wooden plank wall. Each side had twenty shower stalls. There were no showerheads; the water flowed directly down from the bamboo pipes. The floor was also paved with wooden planks, with drainage ditches on both sides. Naturally, the sewage here would not go to a sewage treatment plant but would be discharged directly into the sea.

Guo Sanniang was herded into this large, long room with the crowd. It was wet and damp inside, with many bamboo pipes of various sizes lying around. The female housekeeper—this beautiful and imposing woman must be a housekeeper favored by the master—gestured at them and said something. Then, a maid beside her shouted in Mandarin, Cantonese, and Minnan dialect, telling them to take off their clothes and prepare to bathe!

The women started shouting again. Bathing was a common thing for southerners, but a group of people stripping naked and bathing together was something that had never happened before. Some girls from slightly better backgrounds even squatted on the ground, covering their faces, and resolutely refused to take off their clothes.

The clamor of the women in the bathroom brought the work to a halt again. Ai Beibei was at her wit’s end. She had exhausted all her kind words and tried every possible method to explain and comfort them, but she found that no one was listening to her, or rather, no one could understand. Chu Yu—the maid from Gou Family Village who had voluntarily surrendered to the transmigrators—saw that this female “short hair” in charge was at a loss. She came over and asked respectfully, “Madam, may this servant handle it?”

Ai Beibei wiped the sweat from her forehead. “Hmm? Oh, yes. By the way, how many times have I told you, don’t call yourself a servant. Everyone is equal here—”

“Yes,” Chu Yu replied, knowing that this female “short hair” was spouting some nonsense about everyone being equal again. She didn’t understand it, nor did she want to. Her idea was simple: to do her best to show her abilities and talents in front of the “short hairs” so that she could get a position like a production team leader in the future. So, ever since she joined the production team, she had been diligently learning Mandarin—how could she get ahead if she couldn’t speak the masters’ language?

Chu Yu took a tin megaphone and, with all her strength, roared: “Silence!”

Chu Yu’s roar almost shook the walls. Even Ai Beibei’s ears were ringing a little—no one would have thought that such a slender girl could produce such a shrill sound. Immediately, everyone in the room shut their mouths and stopped.

She turned to face Ai Beibei and saw that this female “short hair” was also dumbfounded. She realized that this was because of her actions.

“Clothes—all—off!” Chu Yu continued to roar. “Anyone who doesn’t take them off will be dragged out and dealt with by family law!” As she spoke, the whip in her hand whistled through the air.

Ai Beibei didn’t like this prison-like performance, but she knew that sometimes, simple and crude was much more effective than patient persuasion. She nodded and slipped away.

Tian Sanniang quickly stripped naked along with everyone else, no longer caring about shyness. One by one, they covered their chests and private parts, trembling with their heads bowed, not daring to look at the others’ pale bodies.

Suddenly, the horizontal bamboo poles above their heads began to spray water, showering down on them like rain. The water had an unpleasant smell. A few surprised cries were heard intermittently from the crowd, but under Chu Yu’s fierce gaze, they quickly quieted down. The female temporary workers brought in a basket of soapbeans—the resource exploration team had collected a lot of them near Bairen Beach, and they were now being used as a temporary substitute for soap. The female workers, in pairs, quickly processed them like they were grabbing chickens: rinsing with water, rubbing with soapbeans, and mercilessly scrubbing with large horsehair brushes. The women didn’t dare to cry out, but soft sobs could be heard here and there.

Guo Sanniang’s entire body was scrubbed with a brush. The skin on her body ached as if it were falling off, and she cried as she was washed—at one point, she thought her skin was going to be scrubbed off, but in reality, the flakes that were coming off were years of accumulated dirt. After she was deemed clean, a female worker led her out and into another room. The housekeeper was wearing a white coat—strange, had someone in this family died?

“Have some water.” The housekeeper’s attitude was quite gentle as she handed over a porcelain bowl. Guo Sanniang obediently drank it. The water was a bit sweet, with a hint of bitterness. Then she lay down on a couch covered with a white cloth, and the housekeeper examined her entire body, not even sparing her private parts and anus. Guo Sanniang was both ashamed and afraid, but she couldn’t understand what was happening. Her mind was a muddle, so she just let her do as she pleased.

The housekeeper looked her over and said to the female worker next to her, “Size XS!” She then took a set of cotton clothes from the shelf. Unexpectedly, these were brand new clothes, not like the old clothes that large households usually gave to new servants. The color was indigo, and the texture was coarse, but they were both clean and soft. The style was just very strange, like a monk’s robe. It was put on over the head, leaving the head and limbs exposed. It looked a bit large after being put on, but there was a belt to tighten it at the waist. The shoes were a pair of wooden clogs.

After getting dressed, the housekeeper gave her a small rattan box, then picked up the bamboo tag around Guo Sanniang’s neck to look at it, and then glanced at a clipboard with paper on it.

“Number 1628020014, personal belongings: one broken-toothed comb,” she said loudly. The female worker next to her then took a steamer from the shelf with the same bamboo tag tied to it. Inside was her comb, still a little damp.

When the two lines of men and women reunited behind the bathroom, Tian Sanwu had a hard time recognizing Guo Sanniang. They were all identical, with bald heads and blue clothes. If you didn’t look closely, you could barely tell the men from the women. Some people secretly laughed—it was quite comical.

“The master can’t be a monk, can he?” someone muttered as they came to a few rows of wooden houses in turn.

“What’s your name? Liu Sanba?” The person asking questions and writing there seemed to be a scholar, although he was also wearing the “short hairs’” cross-collared jacket. Tian Sanwu saw that the man’s hair was so short it was just stubble and knew he must have received the same treatment. Why did the master like to shave all the servants’ heads bald? Tian Sanwu really couldn’t figure it out.

“How many people with the surname Liu is this?”

“Chief, this is the fourth one.”

“Change his name to Liu Si!”

“Got it? From now on, your name is Liu Si!”

“Thank you, master, for bestowing a name—” This person was quite clever. He was just about to kowtow and ask for a reward when he was dragged aside.

“What’s your name, Tian Sanwu?” Zhang Xingjiao, who was asking the questions, looked at the list. “Chief, there’s no one with the surname Tian yet. How about we call him Tian Da?”

“Not creative. Let’s call him Tian Liang.”

“Remember, from now on, your name is Tian Liang!” Zhang Xingjiao registered his name.

The newly named Tian Liang had a bewildered look on his face. Anyway, it was natural for a master to change a servant’s name, and it was much better than something like “Sanwu.”

The registered people stood by the table. Tian Liang peeked over at the girls’ side and finally found Guo Sanniang in the crowd. Seeing that the people around them were not forbidding them to talk, he quietly sidled up and asked, “Sanniang, were you okay just now?”

Guo Sanniang saw that this little brother, with whom she had spent every day for over a year, had also become bald. Thinking of her own appearance, her heart was filled with mixed feelings. She wanted to cover her bald head but had nothing to do it with. She could only blush, nod, and whisper, “I’m fine, it’s just my hair—my hair—”

“When you’re under someone else’s roof, you have to bow your head. Even our lives belong to others, what’s there to say about hair?”

“The master has changed my name to Tian Liang. Have you changed yours?”

Guo Sanniang nodded and said, “I have. Originally, a ‘short hair’ insisted on calling me Guo Jinjin, but someone else didn’t agree, so now it’s changed to Guo Fu.”